Against the Gods

"You... ugh, aghhh..." Mu Hanyi's struggling fingers had deformed by now. His voice had become so hoarse and weak that it was impossible to hear him clearly. Although even ten breaths hadn't passed since he was poisoned, his complexion of his body had entirely changed. The pupils of his eyes, in particular, had turned into the color of thick blood.

"I thank you to bring me here, as well as giving me the opportunity and reason to kill you. Now I can take away this Qilin horn with a clear conscience. Hmph! As thanks, I'll be generous and tell you about two things."

"First, " Yun Che narrowed his eyes, "There's a special reason behind Master giving Mu Feixue to me. So, even if you truly became Master's direct disciple, she would still not give you Feixue. Your claim that I snatched your Feixue is completely ridiculous and baseless."

"Ugh... ah!" Mu Hanyi opened his mouth wide, as scarlet foam of blood overflowed out. All of his teeth had melted away due to the highly toxic poison.

"Second..." Yun Che squatted down, and let out a low sneer, "The horned dragon poison in your body was personally given to me by Master when I was leaving for here. Try to guess, why Master specially had me come here to the Ice Wind Empire, and also handed over such a highly toxic poison to me?"

"..." Mu Hanyi's curled-up body suddenly went stiff. In his lusterless eyes surfaced the most terrified and desperate look he had ever shown in his life.

"Hmph! You might have thought that your performance was flawless, but Master is a Great Realm King who has lived for ten thousand years. Even someone as clever as me would act docile before her, without harboring the slightest thoughts of tricking her. Do you really think that she wouldn't be able to see through your thoughts and schemes?"

"Today, if I had truly died that at this place, Master would have absolutely not accepted you as her direct disciple, as you seem to be deluding. On the contrary, there would be an even tragic end waiting for you."

Mu Hanyi's mouth trembled as it opened, but no sound escaped from it. His curled-up body didn't seem to be able to struggle any further as it only convulsed from time to time.

"The plan proposed by you to shift the blame to mistakenly triggering a mechanism is indeed pretty good. And I also have to thank you for telling me that it's possible to deactivate the profound formation sealing the Qilin horn by making use of your blood. Otherwise, I'd have to put in a lot of time and energy for sure." Yun Che gave him a cold and indifferent smile.

"..." The highly toxic breath quickly spread inside the barrier, and Mu Hanyi had already lost his five senses. He had no way to clearly hear the last words said by Yun Che. With the toxic poison contaminating his entire body, it twitched intensely for a short while before going completely still.

He had finally died a miserable death due to the horned dragon’s breath.

Yun Che stretched out his left hand as the Sky Poison Pearl released its power and fully purified the toxic poison present on Mu Hanyi's corpse. Afterwards, he also purified the poisonous breath that had dispersed inside the barrier, leaving behind no signs of the horned dragon poison.

He stood to his feet, and took a last look at Mu Hanyi's corpse lying silently. He let out a heavy breath of relaxation before saying in a low voice, "He was truly a terrifying person."

He recalled Xuanyuan Wentian.

It was an indubitable fact that Xuanyuan Wentian was an extremely terrifying person, and also the only one who brought him close to losing his life several times. But Mu Hanyi wasn't even thirty and his shrewdness and scheming ability had reached such an extent. If he were living in a lower realm and had lived as long as Xuanyuan Wentian, he would have certainly become a person even more fearful than the latter.

It was a pity that he didn't have the opportunity.

Yun Che fully understood why Mu Xuanyin had initially decided to accept Mu Hanyi as her direct disciple. With his scheming mind and means, he was definitely far more suitable than the pure-hearted Mu Feixue to be someone standing above others.

But, now that she had selected Yun Che, Mu Hanyi's extremely scheming nature would have naturally become a threatening factor to him.

She wanted Yun Che to go to the Ice Wind Empire not only to get the Qilin horn, but also to let him take care of Mu Hanyi, a potential danger.

He had no idea how long it would take for the sealing barrier around him to disappear. Earlier, Mu Hanyi had attacked it with all his power, but even a single crack didn't appear on it. So it was completely unnecessary for Yun Che to waste his energy on trying to forcefully break out. He came right before the barrier, and took a deep breath before stretching out his both hands.

Ice glowed on his left hand, and flames shone on his right.

Yun Che closed his eyes and fully concentrated his mind. After a long period of calm, a berserk airstream suddenly generated within the barrier, causing the glow of the ice and shine of the flames to become even stronger. The chilly and burning energy that should should have engulfed and cancelled out each other, went against the norms and entwined together. Subsequently, they merged and an aura deviating from the laws and rules of the heavens came into existence little by little.

A good while passed before Yun Che opened his eyes again. A ice-blue blaze was calmly burning at the center of his palm.

His attainments in the use and control of flames had always increased at an extremely fast rate. As he had also obtained the Ice Phoenix bloodline at present, the might of the ice flame, that was produced by the fusion of flames and ice, would naturally experience a great increase. Yun Che slowly lifted the ice flame as he spoke in a low voice, "I guess this is my limit... It should be enough to deal with this."

He pushed forward the ice flame, bringing it into contact with the barrier.

Without making any sound, a big gaping hole immediately appeared in the isolating barrier that even Mu Hanyi wasn't able to forcefully break out of; it was quite similar to a fragment of ice coming in contact with flames.

Instantly, the entire barrier swayed intensely as its energy began to dissipate from the opened hole. Soon after, it broke along with a cracking sound, and the fragmented pieces of energy flew away in all directions.

Yun Che looked around, considering which mechanism he should throw Mu Hanyi's corpse to. But after pondering for a short while, he gave up on the thought. It was possible to Mu Hanyi to use such a method for faking the reason behind Yun Che's death, but it was quite unsuitable for Yun Che to try the same. Putting aside the fact that Mu Hanyi was particularly familiar with the mechanisms in the treasury, his body was greatly corroded by the highly toxic poison. As such, it was out of question to make it seem as if was killed by a mechanism.

"Oh well, I should just take away his corpse with me. Otherwise, if they were to find him dead as well as the Qilin horn disappeared, there's a big possibility that they would suspect my involvement. After all, I'm surely the only one Mu Hanyi would willingly bring to this place."

It might be a rather nice idea to make both of them disappear together, making it seem as though Mu Hanyi had left the imperial palace with the Qilin horn... As for the reason, they could think whatever they want.

He didn't immediately store Mu Hanyi's corpse, and instead walked ahead, towards the huge pile of Purple Veined Divine Crystals that were shining with profound light.

Purple stone, purple crystal, and purple jade were currencies in the God Realm. As it had been quite a short time since Yun Che had come to this realm, so it was only natural that he was pitifully lacking in wealth. In Ice Phoenix Palace, he still received five thousand purple stones every month, but after becoming a direct disciple of Mu Xuanyin, he was in actuality, flat broke.

Since he was certain that the area was free from the existence of mechanisms and profound formations, Yun Che continued to walk with large strides, feeling no worries or fear. He didn't show any reservation, and at once stored the mountain-sized pile of purple crystals and the carefully sealed purple jade in his Sky Poison Pearl. Although he didn't know the exact number of the items he had stored, it was certain to be an extremely great wealth as this place was the treasury of a nation's imperial family.

Then, Yun Che changed his direction and stored all the jade boxes containing various kinds of precious pellets and spirit medicine in his Sky Poison Pearl.

It was only a corner of the treasury, but he didn't act greedily and stopped looking for more after storing everything in the area. There were mechanisms and profound formations concealed all around the place, so if he were to carelessly trigger any one of them while trying to get as much treasures as possible, he would meet an unimaginably horrible end.

With such a large amount of purple crystals and purple jade in his possession, Yun Che instantly felt a sense of assurance in his heart. He returned before Mu Hanyi's corpse and flicked his finger towards it. Immediately, a tear opened up in the corpse. A few dark red blood beads flew out, and floated over Yun Che's fingertip.

He slowly walked up to the profound formation that had sealed the Qilin horn.

As the profound formation sealing the halidom within, it was obvious for it to be extremely tenacious. It was unclear whether even the ice flame could break it apart. Yun Che sized up the huge, ice-blue Qilin horn one more time. He jerked his finger, causing the few blood beads he obtained from Mu Hanyi to fall lightly on the sealing profound formation.

When the blood beads came into contact with the profound formation, a faint red light flashed for a moment, after which they completely permeated the formation. At the same time, a muffled metallic sound came from the profound formation as a red mark appeared out of the blue. With the red mark as the center, the whole formation split into two halves, gradually opening sideways.

After the formation was completely opened, he could directly see the Qilin horn that had existed in Ice Wind Empire for over eighty thousand years.

"It seems that Ice Wind Empire has quite a high level profound formation master."

Yun Che sighed with emotion. His body floated up as he made his way ahead with light movements. He approached the Qilin horn at a rather slow pace and finally felt the thing with his own palm.

It was extremely hard to the touch, but devoid of temperature. It didn't even feel chilly as he was expecting. However, he could faintly sense an unprecedented, bizarre feeling that seemed to have come from ancient times.

It was obviously not the right time to investigate the Qilin horn. With a slight pulling gesture of Yun Che's palm, the ten meter long Qilin horn was sucked and brought into the Sky Poison Pearl.

The moment it entered the Sky Poison Pearl, a wisp of profound energy was unleashed from down below. Yun Che's eyebrows shot up, "Oh shoot!"

From beneath the place where the Qilin horn was kept earlier, a profound light shot up to the sky along with a deafening metallic sound. At almost the same moment, profound light flashed crazily in the treasury, activating the all the warning profound formations that issued dazzling light and siren so loud that it could be heard from a few thousand kilometers away.

"Dammit!" Yun Che furrowed his brows... Not only was the Qilin horn sealed in a profound formation, there was also a different profound formation hidden beneath it! So long as the Qilin horn was moved away from its place, the other profound formation would be activated, as well as all the formations in the treasury would be triggered straightaway.

Yun Che gritted his teeth... The Ice Wind Imperial Family was much more careful with the protection of the Qilin horn than he had thought!

Undoubtedly, not only the imperial palace, but also the entire Ice Wind Imperial City must have been alarmed at the moment. The guards outside, a large number of imperial palace experts, and even Feng Huita himself would be arriving at any moment.

"I should have enough time to leave before they arrive!"

Mu Hanyi had said before that only he, Feng Huita, and Feng Hange knew about the secret path to the treasury. Even the guards keeping a watch outside, who were closest to the place, would have to come from the main entrance. Hence, there was enough time to leave from the secret path.

Yun Che quickly calmed down. Then, he turned around to take away Mu Hanyi's corpse.

But the next instant, his movements abruptly stagnated as his hair stood on end.

There was nothing in his line of sight, except for some dark-red bloodstains.

Mu Hanyi's corpse had... disappeared!

It was so startling that Yun Che felt a cold chill run down his spine.

"Who is it!? Who's there!?"

If his corpse was totally eradicated by the toxic poison of the horned dragon, Yun Che could still somehow accept the fact. However, he had just used the Sky Poison Pearl to purify all the toxic poison present on his corpse in order to avoid leaving any traces of the horned dragon's breath... So, how was it possible for the copse to disappear into thin air!?

Furthermore, he had not discovered the aura of any other person until now.

No one replied to his questions. With the warning sound issuing from the treasury, he couldn't hear even the echo of his own voice.

The guards outside could charge in at any time. Yun Che suddenly grit his teeth as he initiated Extreme Mirage Lightning. Following the route in his memory, he dashed to the entrance with his fastest speed.

The door to the secret path was still open. Yun Che rushed into the secret path without slowing down a bit, but he firmly gnashed his teeth as he ran along the way.

There was someone in the treasury other than the two of them! Moreover, it was such a terrifying person that he was simply unable to sense their presence!

If they were present here all along, wouldn't that mean that... they saw everything he did, including the purification of the Sky Poison Pearl and the ice flame?!

Why were they inside the treasury... And for what reason did they take away Mu Hanyi's corpse!?

Who did it!?